Eve of Destruction: A Harry Devlin Mystery

by Edwards, Martin

  ‘Becky? Pretty girl, isn’t she? Works as a receptionist at my doctor’s actually.’

  ‘It is a small world,’ Pino said with the exceptional solemnity he reserved for the uttering of clichés. ‘Ah well. Who am I to begrudge a little snatched happiness to a couple who are so obviously in love?’

  Harry lowered his voice. ‘I had just wondered if Dominic’s ardour was beginning to cool a little.’

  ‘You think so? Well, maybe you are right. Yesterday, it is true, their conversation seemed a little agitated. Not that I overheard anything in particular, you understand.’

  ‘No, no. Of course not. But – they had a tiff, did they?’

  ‘I regret to say that you are right. Voices were raised at one point and the young lady seemed to leave in a state of – shall we say – dudgeon. Mr Revill was plainly upset when he came to settle the bill.’

  There might, Harry thought, be more than one reason for that. Eating regularly at the Ensenada would put a strain on any income. ‘What a shame. Did he say anything to you about their disagreement?’

  ‘It is none of my business, of course,’ Pino said with his customary charming insincerity. ‘But since he obviously confides in you, perhaps I can at least say that something had clearly shaken him. As if he had been given some sort of ultimatum, perhaps. I cannot say for certain, but that was my impression and I am, as you know, a keen student of my fellow man. How else can a restaurateur survive in these difficult times if he fails to take account of his customers’ anxieties?’

  Harry could guess the nature of Dominic’s current anxieties. Becky had decided that a domestic poisoning was too risky and in any event uncertain to succeed. Now she wanted to press on with a joint enterprise in crime. In seeking Dominic’s support, she would not have skimped on melodrama or emotional blackmail. He could hear in his mind the tempting voice he had come to know so well.

  If you really want me, you must help me to become free.

  As he walked back to his office, his thoughts turned back from murder to self-inflicted wounds and he cursed himself for provoking Kim by teasing her about the failed Scissorman prosecution. Yet did any relationship so fragile deserve to survive? She must still be sensitive about their brief bedroom encounter; perhaps she regretted having invited him back and was making herself feel better by seizing the chance to snap at his heels. He still wanted her badly, but he realised that until she was ready to be candid with him and at least explain why she had changed her mind about making love, they had little future together.

  When he arrived back at New Commodities House, Lucy greeted him with the news that Steven Whyatt had come and gone. ‘I told him you were at a lunch meeting and he said he couldn’t wait. So he left this.’

  She flourished a sealed envelope which Harry ripped open. The latest tape fell out. She picked it up and handed it to him, wrinkling her nose as if it smelled foul. ‘More intimate confessions? Do you really have to snoop on this woman and her fancy man?’

  ‘Client’s instructions.’

  Her expression made clear precisely what she thought of Steven Whyatt and his instructions. Lucy was a good judge, he knew, but he could not help feeling a spurt of excitement at the thought that the tape might cast more light on Becky’s murderous intentions. He had often come into contact with murder and he realised in his heart that the explanation for this was not coincidence. Sudden death had been part of his life for as long as he could remember. As a boy of five, he had been playing with his grandfather when the old man suffered the coronary that killed him. During his teens, his parents had been killed by a fire engine screaming through red lights to answer a hoax call. And then there had been Liz, so cruelly slain. He reflected sometimes that after everything that had happened, he ought to be the last person for whom murder should exert an eerie fascination. Yet it was so. He devoured detective novels and when murder touched his life through clients or acquaintances, he could not turn away. It was as if he needed to explore each case in an attempt to make sense of life’s darkest mysteries.

  Yet he found he had to wait before satisfying his curiosity: clients other than Steven Whyatt were demanding his attention. By half past six he was ready to call it a day and on his way out he poked his head round his partner’s door. ‘Busy?’

  ‘Almost done,’ Jim said, seeming more cheerful than of late. ‘Leave it to me to close up and set the alarm.’

  As Harry headed for home, he thought about the evening ahead. The delay caused by his preoccupations of the afternoon had made him more eager than ever to catch up with the next instalment of the lovers’ conversations. Would the murder plot, to coin a phrase, die a natural death? Or would Becky’s determination overcome Dominic’s reluctance to take her seriously?

  It was not until he was putting his key in the lock that he realised there was one small problem with his plan: he had forgotten to bring home the tape Steven Whyatt had left for him. He swore in frustration. He didn’t want to wait until tomorrow to listen to it. With a sigh, he began to retrace his steps. His ankle was still hurting: he hadn’t managed to follow Theo Jelf’s advice about keeping it rested. If he was not careful, he would find himself turned into a case study for the ‘Problem Patient’ spot on ‘Telemedics’.

  Fenwick Court was quiet when he returned. He sighed for the hundredth time at the bold capitals of the sign on the entrance to New Commodities House which read THIS DOOR IS ALARMED. Next to this warning an unimpressed visitor had scrawled AND THIS WINDOW IS BLOODY WELL TERRIFIED. As he fiddled with the fat bunch of keys to the building, he inadvertently leaned against the front door and it began to creak open. ‘So much for security,’ he muttered to himself.

  Jim must have forgotten to shut up shop properly when he left for the night. A few months ago, such absent-mindedness would have been unimaginable. But nowadays his partner so often seemed distracted that his carelessness did not come as a complete surprise. Perhaps pressure of work was at the root of it all. The firm’s policy of offering cut-price wills had attracted plenty of clients. A replacement for Sylvia was desperately needed, otherwise Jim would find himself working round the clock.

  As Harry entered the passage which led to his office, a noise startled him. It was a low moan. Someone else was inside the building. He froze. A burglar? Or had Jim suffered some sort of accident?

  He heard the moan again. No question, it came from Jim’s office. A sixth sense told him to be careful, but Harry’s sixth sense was more accustomed to being over-ruled than the Liverpool industrial tribunal. He took a couple of paces forward and pushed open the door to his partner’s room.

  Never would he forget the sight that greeted his eyes as he looked inside. Had he found the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Pope sharing a joint it would have come as less of a shock.

  Jim hadn’t suffered a accident, but Harry’s first thought was that he must have lost his mind. His partner was hard at work, all right, but he wasn’t studying title deeds. Jim was on his desk with his shirt off and the dark-haired woman wrapped around him had her bra unfastened and her skirt up around her waist. Her face, if not her form, was familiar but for an instant Harry could not put a name to her. The only thing he could be sure of was that the long legs and firm brown breasts he was gaping at did not belong to Heather Crusoe.

  Chapter Eleven

  ‘I should have made my excuses and left,’ Harry said an hour later. He felt bitter, partly with his partner for making him feel a fool, partly with himself for having walked in on the tryst.

  ‘I’m glad you didn’t,’ Jim said. ‘Any road, you looked as stunned as I felt. To say nothing of how Lynn must have felt.’

  ‘Will she be all right?’

  ‘I think so. I hope so. I’ll call her soon, see how she is.’

  ‘Do you think that’s wise?’

  His partner gave him a woebegone look. ‘I abandoned wisdom a long time ago, old son.’

  They were sitting in Harry’s living room, a couple of primed whisky glasses on th
e table that divided them.

  When Harry had made his unexpected entrance, the girl’s gasps of pleasure had turned into a gasp of dismay. While Jim groaned and shut his eyes as if in the hope that it was just a bad dream, she slid on to the floor where she hastily tried to rearrange her clothes into a semblance of respectable attire. All Harry could do was spread his arms helplessly and say, ‘Sorry.’

  While Jim buried his head in his hands, the girl composed herself. ‘We’re the ones who ought to be saying sorry.’ Then she turned to Jim. ‘You were right, it wasn’t a good idea. My mistake. It’s better that I go now.’

  Even as she spoke, Harry remembered her name. Lynn DeFreitas was a police constable who had entered their lives the previous February when she’d been sent round to investigate a burglary in the office. Surely this was taking victim support to extreme lengths? As she hurried through the door and out of sight, he turned to his partner and said, ‘A fair cop? I know the police like to take everything down, but that was ridiculous.’

  ‘Spare me the jokes, Harry.’

  ‘What do you want, a round of applause?’

  His partner bent his head. ‘Why did you come back?’

  ‘I forgot something.’

  ‘You and your bloody bad memory. Oh God, don’t give me that look. I know what you’re thinking. What about you? Have you forgotten you’re a married man?’

  ‘It’s none of my business.’

  ‘Well, it wasn’t. But now it is. You can’t just bugger off after the damage has been done. I need to talk to someone, get things off my chest. You’re all I’ve got.’

  ‘You’ve got a family that many men would kill for,’ Harry said softly.

  ‘You know what I mean.’

  ‘Okay. Come back to the flat for a drink and a chat. I owe you that after bursting in.’

  Now Jim was finishing his second stiff scotch and trying to come to terms with the evening’s disastrous close encounter. He exhaled and said, ‘The funny thing is, you know, in all my married life, I’ve never had an affair before.’

  Harry knew his partner was telling no less than the truth. Jim had always been the most uxorious of men. He’d known Heather since their days at school together and they had become engaged as soon as he started at university, marrying on a shoestring during his two years as an impoverished articled clerk with Maher and Malcolm, where his path had first crossed with Harry’s. The kids had soon followed: Harry was godfather to young John and went to extravagant lengths each year to remember his birthday in time. Jim had settled into cosy domesticity; the only eccentric move he’d ever made in his life was to set up in business with a litigation lawyer who found it easier to read Braille than a balance sheet. The partnership had its share of rocky moments and outsiders reckoned that the two of them made chalk and cheese look like identical twins. Despite that, the marriage of opposites continued to work and Harry had always assumed the same was true of Jim’s life with Heather. She shared with Jim a sturdy Lancastrian reliability that the average Scouser might envy although never attempt to emulate.

  ‘Had you met Lynn before she came to investigate the breakin?’

  ‘Talk about coincidence! We’d actually met a couple of weeks before, at one of those do-it-yourself superstores which are staffed by a couple of girls and one brawny lad who never knows where the power drills are kept. Lynn’s trolley was full to overflowing and she crashed it into mine. I helped her to pick up the pieces and we chatted for a couple of minutes. I took to her at once, but I never gave it another thought. As soon as we met the second time, we recognised each other and had a laugh about it. I realised I fancied her. And – there was something in her manner that made me think the feeling might be mutual. Of course, I couldn’t be sure. As you well know, I’ve always been a one-woman man, I’m not used to picking up the signals. I suppose you think that sounds feeble.’

  ‘No,’ Harry said sadly. ‘The older I get, the more the so-called signals seem to need a soothsayer to interpret them.’

  ‘After she’d taken a few details about the burglary, I asked about her do-it-yourself work. She said she’d hit a few snags and I gathered that there wasn’t a man around.’

  ‘Sexist.’

  ‘Not at all. She obviously had far more nous about building work than a feller like you.’

  ‘Not difficult. Whoever designed the Leaning Tower of Pisa knew more about construction than me. Go on.’

  ‘She obviously didn’t hold out much hope of catching the thief, but she said she’d do her best to keep me informed if there was any more news. And within twenty-four hours she gave me a ring.’

  ‘Not about a breakthrough in the investigation,’ Harry said. He had been the one who had discovered the burglar’s identity.

  ‘No, just a quick update on the lack of progress. I couldn’t help feeling it was an unnecessary call. Another signal, maybe. We started chatting and she told me she was still struggling with her new kitchen. Like one of your murder suspects, I had both motive and opportunity. So I offered to drop in and give her a hand sometime. She seemed eager to accept. After I put the phone down, I asked myself what I was doing. A respectable married man sniffing round an attractive woman.’

  ‘Surely not too difficult a question to answer?’

  ‘You don’t understand.’

  ‘No,’ Harry said, ‘I don’t. I thought I was the one who always succumbed to temptation.’

  ‘Aren’t you glad to learn you don’t have the monopoly on stupidity?’

  ‘No, I’m bloody not.’ He glared at Jim. ‘Don’t you realise I’ve always envied you what you have?’

  He hadn’t meant to say that and his partner looked as startled as he felt himself about the sudden admission. But of course it was true. Jim’s life had always seemed to him to be conventional, perhaps even complacent, but undoubtedly happy. His own instinct was always to be sceptical about tales of connubial bliss, but seeing the Crusoes together had come close to convincing him that one or two marriages might be made in Heaven. To catch Jim out came as a bitter blow. He made a throwaway gesture with his right hand and said brusquely, ‘Never mind that now. Does Heather have any idea about what’s been going on?’

  ‘Not a great deal has been going on. No need to look like that. I’m telling you the truth. We haven’t been sleeping together. Tonight is the closest we have come to making love.’

  Harry stared at him. ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘Never more so. When I went round to her place, we talked – oh about many things. Including DIY, would you believe? We were on the same wavelength, right from the very start. That’s why I wanted to become involved with her, even though I knew it was insane. But when it was time to go, I simply pecked her on the cheek and said that perhaps we could see each other again sometime. She told me she’d like that. I’ve asked myself a thousand times since if I disappointed her that day, if she secretly hoped that I’d seduce her there and then. But I’d be kidding myself if I thought she believed that. She told me later she’d had an unhappy time with her last boyfriend. I’ve never sensed she was in a hurry to get hooked up with a married man.’

  ‘So she knew about Heather and the kids?’

  ‘I made a point of telling her. And no, I never claimed that my wife didn’t understand me. I didn’t want any lies.’ He thought for a moment. ‘Or at least no more than were absolutely necessary. It wasn’t all about sex – much as I fancy her. I liked her, too. Loved talking to her. When you’ve been married for as long as Heather and me, you take so many things for granted. It’s human nature, isn’t it? I don’t accept that it’s proof that something has gone wrong between us. Our relationship’s strong. You have the evidence of your own eyes and ears for that. I don’t want to split up, our marriage will survive – at least as long as she doesn’t find out. How can I explain about Lynn? I suppose I was simply hungry for more.’

  Jim was talking mainly for his own benefit, Harry realised, trying to reconcile the irreconcilable. A new nar
rator of an old, old story. ‘I realised a long time ago that something was preying on your mind.’

  ‘Has it been so obvious?’

  ‘To me, yes. And I’m not just talking about the new haircut, though that was alarming enough. Actually, I thought you were worried about the business.’

  For the first time that evening Harry saw his partner’s strong features soften into a smile. ‘Listen, old son, if I allowed myself the luxury of worrying about the business, I wouldn’t have any time left to see my wife, let alone my girlfriend.’

  ‘You’ve seen Lynn regularly?’

  Jim shook his head. ‘Far from it. Heather expects me home in reasonable time every night. We spend most weekends with either her parents or mine. And Lynn often works shifts, plus more than her fair share of overtime. It was more a question of snatching the odd hour here and there.’

  ‘And tonight?’

  ‘I won’t pretend the relationship has been entirely platonic before tonight. We’ve had a few cuddles. But neither of us has wanted to rush things – for a host of reasons, I suppose. All the same, I’ve imagined making love to her more times than I care to remember. Didn’t an American president once talk about committing adultery in the heart? On that score, I’m as guilty as any of the philanderers whose hands you hold in the divorce courts.’

  ‘Not quite the same thing.’

  ‘I doubt if Heather would agree.’

  ‘She’s no fool.’

  ‘More than you can say about me, eh? Of course, both Lynn and I knew what was in each other’s mind. We’ve been heading for make or break during the past few weeks. I promised that we’d spend an evening together – at least. I’d spun Heather a yarn about having to attend a client’s snooker tournament. Rather than drink and drive, I would stay overnight.’

  ‘And?’

  ‘I booked a room for two at the Adelphi.’

  ‘Ah.’

  ‘Sordid, eh?’

  ‘No. Sad.’

  ‘You’re fond of Heather, aren’t you?’

  ‘That’s not the point. I thought this sort of mess was my prerogative.’